Rainbow Dash was beautiful, the most beautiful pony to be born in a century — and so her fate was sealed. Beauty must be sacrificed, and so Rainbow Dash must die.

Winner of the 2023 EFNW Iron Author Contest. I think I beat out about 40 other writers, and it was hugely exciting to win. Hope you enjoy the read!

Prompts were: vibrant vestigial, vexing volcano, verdant vegetable. Pretty insane for prompts, but Xepher had to pronounce all the Aztec words in my story so I think we're even.

Sunset didn't realize just how different other dimensions could be before going through the portal. Now she finds herself in a world where people never age or grow, they just attend high school forever. Whether she's entered a paradise or a nightmare remains to be seen.

After losing her sister, Rarity buries herself in her work.

Just as lost, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, armed with a personal Ogres & Oubliette's module, try to help the seamstress open more than just her boutique.

❄ Trigger Warnings: death, homophobia (implicit, explicit, slurs)
❄ An intimate epic written for FanOfMostEverything's Imposing Sovereigns II.
❄ Loosely inspired by the stage play of the same name by Qui Nguyen.
❄New adventurers beware! Spoilers lurk in the comments.
❄ Story is complete and is the silver medalist.
❄ Royal Canterlot Library featured. Highly Recommended by Present Perfect. Review by cleverpun. WHYRTY - PaulAsaran

Twilight has too much time on her hooves.

Twilight has a spell that involves 'transposing male characteristics' that she hasn't tried yet.

Twilight is about to get herself into a whole world of trouble.

-
Translated into Russian(!) by the amazing repitter with editing by FoxcubRandy

Principal Celestia always has wings in her dreams.

They got her into trouble, once. She let herself believe that they meant she was an angel. Then she grew up, and learned some hard lessons about what being an angel really required.

Now six magical girls have just fought a demon in front of her school. And her phantom wings are itching.

Her life is turning upside down ... and she hasn't even heard about Equestria yet.

Rated Highly Recommended (Top 15 Stories Sitewide) by Present Perfect! "It's f**king flawless, you guys. … The first [6]00-word chapter by itself is a masterpiece."

"Literally the single best EqG story on the site." —Professor Plum
"[One] of the best stories on the site, period." —Pearple Prose
"One of my all-time favorite pieces of fanfiction." –brokenimage321
"My favorite EQG fic of absolute all." -Skywriter

Rated Why Haven't You Read This Yet? by PaulAsaran! "I might have been skeptical going in, but horizon knocked it out of the park."

Rated 5/5 by csquared08! "The opening chapter here was truly something else. ... Then I hit the end of chapter 3. holy crap."

Rated ★★★★ by Louder Yay! "A lesser writer might have made a horrible, cliché-ridden mess of this story, but fortunately horizon is not a lesser writer. For a start, it's by some distance the best portrayal of the human world's Celestia I've read."

Third place in the "Under the Sun" June 2017 Writeoff!  (That first draft has been revised and expanded for FIMFiction.) Praise for the Writeoff version:

"Holy cow ... That's how you write an EqG fanfic! You captured the heart and SOUL of this/your version of Principal Celestia, wrapped it up in bi-universal consistency, and sold me on an idea of redemption I didn't even know I needed." —Xepher

"This is gorgeous. A thorough, exhaustive, incredibly moving portrait of a character who I don't think I've ever seen get quite this much development or attention." —Posh

"This is actually, after all these years, an original take on a story on Luna's banishment. If that's not something to be celebrated I don't know what is." —Quill Scratch, Radio Writeoff

MORE REVIEWER PRAISE: Rated "Definitely Read" by Super Trampoline! Reviewed by City of Doors! Reviewed by Titanium Dragon! Featured on Equestria Daily!

Rated T for brief cursing and alcohol use. Cover art by Seniloko, used under Creative Commons license.

Translations:

中文 - 行政天使

When I first met Princess Twilight, she was confused, lost. Adrift in an alien world. I thought of her as a rich eccentric, certainly a foreigner. I humored her as much as I believed her, really. Even when she dragged me to the very ends of the world in her mad quest for a mythic well, I really did it all for her. I figured it would help her find some closure, and we could go home.

I was right, in a way.

Based roughly on the game 80 Days.

They say minotaurs live by the scars they bear. Bismuth's hide is a map of the world. His life was the blade, and the blade was his life, carried unto a hundred red fields, down a thousand roads, singing among elk, deer, and dragons. He stood at ramparts long since fallen, and was counted a hero in lands forgotten, when ponies had only begun to dream.

Maybe it's all true, but now he rocks in his chair, stirring at embers, while his deeds turn to rust in the shadows. What kind of scars call that living? And if you ask him, would he tell you?

--
Seek hope even in darkness.
Spanish translation by SPANIARD KIWI: https://www.deviantart.com/spaniard-kiwi/art/Los-debiles-968627541
Audio reading by CreepyPastaSalad: Clicket!
Inspired by Jetfire's "Dangerous Business" and "Besides the Will of Evil."

There once was a story about the beautiful dark alicorn who moved the moon. In the tranquil countryside, a young boy listened to the story, looked at the stars, and imagined. He grew up and fell in love with the ruler of the night … and she loved him, too.

It was perfect, except for one nagging doubt in the back of the quiet boy's head: she was a character from a children's story.

Winner of the Writeoff Association's "Written In The Stars" competition! ** Featured on Equestria Daily ** Featured by The Royal Guard (twice! )

Rated ★★★★★ by Louder Yay! "This is, perhaps, a Lucky Dreams story for grown-ups. ... Plenty of magic and friendship here, but also sadness and loss ... a clear classic."

Highly Recommended by Present Perfect! "An excellently written story about an emotional encounter between the titular characters … yet a good bit more than that. If you like reading, you will like reading this."

Recommended by Titanium Dragon! "This story had an excellent style to it, a sort of fairy-tale-like quality … really, this is a work of original fiction which pokes at MLP in only the barest of ways. But that doesn't mean it isn't relevant to your interests."

Art: Assembled by me. Luna vector by azur-wing.

To Twilight Sparkle and Princess Celestia, it is a simple surprise visit to Canterlot. To the ponies of the Equestrian Civil Service, it is twenty-four hours of chaos, politics, weaponized dessert, politics, underhooved manipulation of media, politics, and things batrachian and tentacular. Who said bureaucracy isn't exciting?

Rainbow Dash's first sonic rainboom makes headlines across Equestria. Every reporter is out to cover the story from their own angle. Sometimes they get it partly right.

She’s going down in history. Maybe.